So long, Bobby!

It’s the end of an era: For nearly five decades the Boeing 737 – affectionately known as Bobby – flew for Lufthansa. Now, this sturdy, dependable city hopper is being retired.

2 300 000 000

The 737 jets have flown around 2.3 billion kilometers for Lufthansa – roughly 300 trips from the earth to the moon and back.

250 000 000

Some 250 million Lufthansa passengers have flown on board a Boeing 737.

3200

The furthest flight was 3200 kilometers, from Frankfurt to Las Palmas, Canary Islands.

148

In 1965, Lufthansa was the first airline to order a Boeing 737-100 jet – 21 in fact – and help establish the 737. Since their delivery in 1968, 148 jets from this series, 737-100s, 737-200s, 737–300s, 737-400s and 737-500s, have flown for Lufthansa.

1990

The first Lufthansa flight to West Berlin was with a 737: On October 2, 1990, the Sindelfingen flew parliamentarians from Cologne/Bonn to Berlin-Tegel for the German reunification celebrations.

1996

Heaven’s airplane. In 1996, Pope John Paul II traveled on board the Bad Homburg from Paderborn to Tegel Airport in Berlin and then on to Rome.

1969

Why Bobby? The kids’ book Bobby Boeing Earns His Wings was published in 1969. In it the Boeing 707 was the dad, the 727 the mom, and the 737 was the baby – called Bobby. The crews started using the name, and it stuck.